Browsing Posts tagged Amos Otis

Sometimes the bullets come on the weekends, sometimes they come on a Wednesday. I’m unpredictable like that. If you are like me, you scour the internet for hours on end looking for interesting articles and tidbits relating to the Kansas City Royals. If you are unlike me and have a much better way to spend your free-time, then just let me do the work for you. I’ve scoured the entire interbots for you to bring you these bullets and links. Enjoy

I’ve heard entirely too much about how many double plays Billy Butler has grounded into. The bottom line is that it really isn’t a big deal. First, here is the list of players who hit into the most double plays in the MLB in 2010:

Billy Butler

Michael Cuddyer

Pablo Sandoval

Adrian Beltre

Albert Pujols

Derrick Lee

Ty Wiggington

Torii Hunter

Derek Jeter

It’s pretty darn good company. With runners on 1st and less than 1 out Billy Butler had a .950 OPS, Albert Pujols had a .901. Butler is slow, puts the ball into play a lot and plays for a team with a bunch of singles hitters. It’s a perfect recipe for hitting into a ton of double plays. It’s really not a big deal.

Matt Eddy at Baseball America has all of the minor league transactions for the past week. The Royals re-signed Luis Mendoza, Cody Clark and Jamie Romak. Nothing really surprising there. Romak had a fantastic Pan Am Qualifying tournament where he was named tournament MVP. The Royals have had an odd fascination with Luis Mendoza since obtaining him from the Rangers, I’ve never got it.

I-70 Baseball has been doing an epic retrospective on the 1985 World Series in honor of the 25th anniversary. I contributed an article on Dick Howser’s use rather non-use of Dan Quisenberry in Game 2. There are a bunch of articles, check them out.

I’ve read some things mentioning that Zack Greinke’s no-trade clause includes most of the big market teams. This is pretty standard and it doesn’t mean he can’t get traded there. Players usually put the big-market teams on their no-trade list because those teams have money to spend and the player can use his clause to get leverage and force the team to pick up options he has in his contract. It doesn’t mean he doesn’t want to win or that he is scared of big markets.

Jeff Zimmerman at Royals Review busts out his slide rule and charts to determine with what I’d call 100% accuracy the reason the Royals didn’t make the playoffs. Just try and prove him wrong, I dare you.

If you want to follow just two teams during the offseason, I’d recommend the Surprise Rafters in the Arizona Fall League and the Senadores de San Juan of the Liga de Beisbol Professional de Puerto Rico. Both have a bunch of high quality Royals prospects. You could also just get my Royals Report email and let me send you (almost) daily updates on who is doing what. Just email me at brokenbatsingle at gmail dot com.

David over at Royals Zone has a list of the top 10 Royals of all time. I think it might surprise you, however I am in 100% agreement with his #2. It’s the most underrated Royal in history and if I could get one jersey, it’d be his. That’s a teaser, check out the site yourself. But the players name rhymes with Shmamos Shmotis, no more hints.

The World Series begins today, you should check out the San Francisco Giants and Texas Rangers blogs from the Sweet Spot Network, they do excellent work. Who are you rooting for? I’m not rooting for a team, I’m rooting for a 7 game series.

Would it surprise you if this was the least active off-season in recent Royals history? It wouldn’t surprise me. I’m of the belief that it’s a good thing, but it’s weird considering this season was so terrible.

Question: Why don’t the Yankees outspend everyone in the draft? I really don’t know the answer to this.